NateBeaty

Confused as a Proud American

November 06, 2008

When I stopped by my local overstocked California liquormart to take home my six-pack and Silver Patrón, the man at the counter said “HAHA! GREAT NIGHT TO BREATHE EASY! THE FUCKING NAZIS ARE FINALLY GONE!” He had just given away his last newspaper to an old lady who thanked him profusely. Newspapers selling out at the liquor store?! Whatever could this be? Why, it’s an historic day of the United States of Nearly Failing America, who has just miraculously elected an incredibly intelligent, seemingly party-neutral, articulate, aware and straight-talking BLACK MAN as president.

I’m stunned.

I can honestly say I have never felt proud to be an American. I have long felt an outsider of not only this country, but of the entire human race in general. The world at large has been in a longtime love affair with the USA, slowly migrating toward our increasingly gross tendencies, our materialism, our addiction to youth and perpetual economic growth and military bicep bulging. The closest I’ve come to feeling proud of America is when I fell in love with jazz.

But I choked up when listening to Barack Obama’s acceptance speech on radio, and again the next day when watching it on hulu:

What can I say, it gives me hope. Even though before his acceptance I had just watched an interview with Bob Barr who professed that Repugnicans and Democraps were two sides of the same Big Government coin and lamented the inability for libertarians or independents to have a shit’s nickel of a chance, I still feel that Barack has the potential to truly turn this country around, to reverse the catastrophic fail of the last 8 years of thieving neocons, who left the country not only in economic shambles but viewed by the world as a belligerent, megalomaniac bully.